Happy Feet
by midgewood58
Summary: In an attempt to assimilate with American Muggle culture, Ronald Weasley partners with a shy, oft-absent Muggle named Peter Parker. HPSpider-Man (movie canon).


**Happy Feet**  
By Midge Wood

Disclaimer: Harry, Ron, and Hermione are J.K. Rowling. Peter and Mary, er, Jane, are Stan Lee and Steve Dikto. New York City is the United States'. There's also some altered dialogue here from "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban," as in the script, as in that thing that was written by Steve Kloves. I don't have an original bone in my body.

**Author's Notes:** Muchos gracias to shellebelle for betaing this for me. God bless and enjoy!

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I  
Victims of the Press

After the war had ended and England had been freed from the horror of Voldemort, Harry Potter and his friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger found it burdensome to live in their native country. Their fame had increased tenfold. They could no longer step outside of their homes without being bombarded with photographers and reporters from The Daily Prophet. Although they appreciated the love England showed them, they were, frankly, tired of being treated like anything but normal citizens. Harry was sick of being asked questions about Voldemort, and Ron and Hermione were sick of being asked questions about where one could find Harry Potter. Thus, they reached a unanimous decision that they could no longer live in England for the time being, and resolved to temporarily hide out in a place where they were assured peace and quiet: New York City.

In truth, the decision had not exactly been "unanimous," if "unanimous" means that they decided to move to New York City at the same time. Rather, chance brought the three of them together in the Big Apple—Harry having moved there first after five years of roaming, Ron and Hermione sometime later, looking for Harry, who they found without much effort sitting behind them in a pizzeria. It need not be elaborated that their reunion was teary-eyed and joyous, and that the trio spent many hours catching up, even until the evening, where they continued their conversation in a café full of Muggles. Given that they could not discuss their magical excursions in such settings, they instead chose to talk about the city. Harry turned the conversation toward famous New York City personalities. "And the citizens keep talking about this Spider-Man…"

"A spider-what?" said Ron, who had spilled his coffee.

"Ron," Hermione said, "you've fought with the worst of…our kind, and yet you're still afraid of little spiders?" She snorted. Harry did, too. "Honestly. If anything this is just a silly rumor the tabloids have come up with, like," she added in a whisper, "_The Quibbler_."

"There's actually a tabloid that's always reporting bad things about him," said Harry. "Everyone says it's a load of rubbish. I'd believe them, too, if the rumors were true. You can never trust the press." Harry gave a reassuring look to Ron. Ron, however, looked rather traumatized, as if he would not be able to erase from his mind the image of an eight-legged human anytime this night. The suggestion that they all go out and walk was met with a reluctant whimper from Ron. Only when Harry had insisted he'd never seen Spider-Man in the seven months he lived in New York City did Ron allow himself to be dragged outside the café.

Ron's nerves eased as they walked through the streets together. He found himself entranced by the lights and technology, and joked to his friends about how much his father, Arthur, would love them. Just when Ron became fully confident that nothing out of the blue would happen that night, especially no run-ins with a "spider man," he was suddenly knocked over by a speeding pedestrian. When Harry and Hermione tried to help him up, they were all knocked over by three or four policemen, who muttered a rushed apology as they ran by. A dark-haired young man around their age was the only one of the oncoming rush who actually stopped to help them up and the only one who made a sincere apology for not seeing them there. He disappeared the moment they tried to thank him. Thankfully the trio walked in the opposite direction; otherwise Ron would have seen exactly whom he didn't want to see.

II  
Muggle Pursuits

They had secured jobs in wizarding New York City, but had decided to live as Muggles for a while. The press would find it hard to locate them in the Muggle city, even if wizards employed them. Harry, Ron, and Hermione trusted their employers would not sell their information to the press, and it seemed, two months later, that they were keeping their end of the bargain. Meanwhile, Harry and Hermione had started the very difficult task of integrating Ron into Muggle society. If it hadn't been for continued rumors of the you-know-what, the task wouldn't have been so difficult. Remarkably, neither Harry nor Hermione used magic to lure Ron out of their shared apartment.

By summer Ron had gotten over his fear, and having not seen the _you-know-what_, dismissed it as Muggle nonsense. He began to seek out Muggle pursuits on his own, keeping it secret from Harry and Hermione, who made several efforts to guess what it was. They supposed it had something to do with Ron's new companionship with a Muggle named Peter Parker.

Peter was a familiar face at the pizzeria that had now become their hangout spot. He was rather shy, and often came there either to study, to fall asleep while studying, or to run off somewhere mid-way through studying. These sudden disappearances usually involved police sirens and were not explained, as Peter would quickly change the subject if it were brought up. Still, even as Harry and Hermione got to know Peter better, they could not guess how Ron had become friends with him, or what, if anything, he had to do with Ron's secret pursuit.

The mystery began to unravel mid-way through summer when Hermione walked in on Ron dancing the Mambo from "West Side Story." She had just returned from picking up a few groceries on her day off, and was quite shocked to see Ron vigorously dancing with a mop and shouting "Mambo!" whilst a phonograph blasted the appropriate music. Suffice it to say, whatever was soft and squishy or fragile was squished or broken when Hermione dropped the grocery bags in disbelief. Ron dismissed his actions as "nothing" and replaced the mop and the phonograph to their proper places, blushing furiously.

The truth was revealed to Harry Potter weeks later. Ron had entered the pizzeria in a foul mood, and, after searching the pizzeria (presumably for Peter), he asked of Hermione's whereabouts. "She's working tonight," said Harry. "Why? What's up?"

Ron scowled, but began to look like Dobby on the edge of revealing a big secret. Sighing deeply, he replied, "I'm taking dancing lessons."

"_What_?"

"Well, you guys seemed pretty antsy about fitting me in with the Muggles. After I figured the…_you-know-what_…wasn't real, I decided to take up something Muggle. One day I found this ad in the Muggle paper for dancing and thought that'd be a good place to start. I knew a few of our steps, but I was really interested in learning about how the Muggles danced, especially since, you know, Hermione is a Muggleborn, and, er, I wanted to be able to dance with her if she took me to a Muggle bar or something…that's where I met Peter."

Harry was still trying to digest "I'm taking dancing lessons," so he let Ron continue.

"Anyway, he was taking lessons for this girl he liked, Mary Sue or someone like that, so we had a lot in common. Since there weren't any girls left to take as dancing partners, we, er, became dancing partners…and we were doing pretty well until we started talking about what we'd do for the recital."

"There's going to be a recital?" Harry snorted.

"Yes, there's going to be a recital!" Ron said defensively. "Peter and I are going to be doing ours together…or we were, until he suggested we do something really _stupid_…" Ron banged his fists on the table. "He wants me to tap-dance!" he cried. "_I don't wanna tap-dance!_"

"You tell him, Ron," said Harry, unable to contain his laughter. Ron, however, took Harry's advice seriously.

"Yeah," he said, rising to his feet with a determined look on his face. "I _will_ go tell him. I'm going to march to that dancing studio tonight and I'm going to tell him that I _do not _want to tap-dance." Ron indeed began to march out the pizzeria, but ran into a rushed and harried-looking Peter Parker. When they had picked themselves up, Ron rounded on Peter, insisting that he not tap-dance for the recital in a loud and angry voice. Peter looked bewildered and shocked. He apologized, not knowing why Ron objected to tap-dancing. It took a good minute for Ron to confess, "Because, er…_ican'ttap-dance_."

"I could always teach you," said Peter. Ron shot his head up and looked at Peter if he had gone insane. "Look, I know the recital is next week, but I thought up this really good routine, and if we could practice on it a bit…" Unfortunately, before Ron could comment, the sounds of sirens blared. "Um, I gotta go," said Peter, and in an instant he had gone. Ron looked perplexedly at Harry, who was sitting in their usual booth, gasping with laughter.

III  
Dancing Partners

"I knew you were up to something when I caught you dancing with that mop!" said Hermione as she danced with Ron. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Wanted it to be a surprise," Ron said. "Besides, well, it _was_ kind of embarrassing…"

"Embarrassing? I thought it was _brilliant_."

Ron blushed more, and pulled Hermione closer. She was, he discovered, not a good dancer, and could not keep up with his newfound dance steps, though she critiqued his and Peter's tap-dancing. Both had wound up entwined with chairs on the floor, causing a great fit of laughter to erupt through the entire audience. It took a while before Peter found as much humor in the situation as Ron, "probably because he tripped in front of Mary Sue," said Ron. He briefly eyed his former dancing partner talking with the aforementioned Mary Sue, the very same Mary Sue Peter claimed had no romantic interest in him, nor he in her, though Ron could see that was a load of rubbish.

He turned his gaze to Harry, sitting in a corner, looking at Peter and Mary Sue with a hint of longing in his face. Did Harry also like Mary Sue? Ron shook his head, and smirked when he realized that Mary Sue had flaming red hair, just like his sister, Ginny. He also noted that, if Peter wore glasses, he could pass for a tidy-haired Harry. His grin grew wider. Perhaps, soon, Harry would tire of New York City and say he wanted to move back to England. Ron knew he'd be the first to pack his bags. He missed his family and his classmates, and though he loved the city and had made a new friend, he couldn't wait to get back home. And if Ron's interpretation of Harry's gaze was correct, he wasn't the only one who wanted to see Ginny again. Smiling, he slowly spun Hermione around, and wasn't the slightest bit surprised when Peter disappeared at the wailing sounds of sirens.

THE END.


End file.
